Not sure what I should be doing atm, as a new player that has ambitions to be a tank

At the moment I have just levelled up my Paladin and am slowly building up his gear in LFR mode. Now I'm locked out on the lower 4 sets of LFR instances, what do you think I should be doing to speed up my ability to be a good tank?

I've already grinded the Mantid mobs at Nizuao Temple and am honoured with Wrathion and am slowly completing that questline. Is there anything else I could be doing to slowly better myself as a tank in my downtime? Perhaps grinding rep with a certain faction or doing dailies somewhere?

I would suggest you to make a log of yourself doing LFR doing your best, then head over the Fix My Tanking thread in the paladin forums and ask for pointers, aswell as linking your armory etc.

Volun-told - A supposedly optional event, award, assignment, or activity in which a person (or persons) are required to attend either by persons-in-charge nominating them or their peers expecting them to be there. The individual often has no say in the matter, and non-attendance in frowned upon.I am so tired of seeing terrible people, being admired, for being terrible people.

Hc scenario's are good for lucky drops, also complete the solo scenario for old charms (gold ones) for pugging MSV, HOF and TOES normal for gear. also you can get the 502 boots from org questline if you dont have 502 ones already.
Finally valour, once you get the BiS shit from rep, use it to upgrade the better items you have.

Some really awesome suggestions I will start looking into all of them, thank-you so much.

Also, Jakaroth:

Originally Posted by Jakaroth

Hc scenario's are good for lucky drops, also complete the solo scenario for old charms (gold ones) for pugging MSV, HOF and TOES normal for gear. also you can get the 502 boots from org questline if you dont have 502 ones already.
Finally valour, once you get the BiS shit from rep, use it to upgrade the better items you have.

lithiel.

Are you saying I should focus on getting the neck/rings etc with valor first and then upgrading, or do you think I should upgrade the LFR gear I have straight away?

As a paladin the Shado-Pan Assault DPS gear is typically better for tanking than the tank gear due to how many pieces have Haste and how Haste scales for Protection. With you valor I would buy these items in the following order:

Given the amount of time it takes to get the following valor pieces listed above chances are you'll have gotten Normal tier from Nalak for gloves and legs. You'll need to ask someone more familiar with Paladins than I to see if the Tank 2 set (Gloves+Legs) is better than DPS 2 set (Gloves+Legs) but if it's like DKs then just get DPS 2 set. Also, with the falling price of Haunting Spirits I recommend buying the 522 DPS crafted Helm and Boots (both are Haste/Mastery with red sockets granting mastery if you get the bonus, might be worth sticking Haste/Mastery gems in every socket). For Chest and Shoulder sockets I'd probably go for DPS 2 set from LFR due to itemization over Tank 2 set.

In ToT LFR you should change loot specialization as follows for each boss:

1. Jin'rohk - Prot (for the 1h axe), Ret (for the belt and bracers)
2. Horridon - Ret (Bracers, Trinket)
3. Council - nothing drops that's major for either spec, probably stay Prot for chance at shared boss loot 1h Hit+Mastery sword
4. Tortos - Prot (for shared boss 1h and shared boss shield)
5. Megeara - Prot (see Tortos, also the tank belt isn't too bad either due to gem sockets)
6. Ji-Kun - Ret (Fabled Feather of Ji-Kun, not Rising Winds. Reforge Hit-> Haste. Go Prot for future kills once you have Fabled if you still need a 1h or shield due to shared boss drop)
7. Durumu - Ret (Bracers, Legs if you don't have tier) or Prot (Cloak+Gloves+Boots aren't bad due to the sockets on them making up for Dodge+Parry itemization)
8. Primordius - Prot (until you get a 1h+shield, also has tank legs and shoulders with sockets) then Ret (Ring mostly, also has DPS gloves that are Hit+Haste with sockets)
9. Dark Animus - Ret (no real reason to be Ret over Prot but the tank trinket is so bad I'd rather pass up an opportunity of getting shared boss items than risk getting that trinket. Only interested in Tier Chest and possibly Crit+Haste helm if you still need a 502)
10. Iron Qon - Prot (Tier Shoulders + Exp/Mastery 1h sword)
11. Twins - Doesn't really matter which spec you are other than Tier Helm has best chance as Prot.
12. Lei Shen - Prot (all the drops aren't too bad for tank but mostly chasing the shield if you need).

If you're joining a mediocre guild, just show up in LFR gear and have them gear you before next tier, start out as off tank.
If you're joining a higher end guild, do what I said above but use that guild as a stepping stone once you get gear and experience for higher guilds.

Tanking is pretty important. Here's the things you need to watch out for:
1. Know positioning on all fights. If you fuck up the positioning then the DPS will yell at you.
2. Know when to manage you cooldowns (you can read up strategies on this) or your healers will be upset.
3. Get gear and try your hardest to be flavor of the month tank (lol). Every healer loves a tank who doesn't take a lot of damage.

Once you do those 3 things sufficiently you have the basics down of a great tank, then you moved on to advanced things like making your DPS count and some better situational tricks and how to coordinate with healers and cotank, etc.

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Hmmmmm. Looking back it seems you only wanted gear advice.........................

I'm one of those people with their PC specs listed in their signature now. Aryan PC Master Race.

Are you saying I should focus on getting the neck/rings etc with valor first and then upgrading, or do you think I should upgrade the LFR gear I have straight away?

Should buy the expertise shado-pan assault trinket, after that focus on valor upgrades. You could possibly buy neck/ring if you have really shitty items there, but valor upgrades on your nice items are also okay.

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Originally Posted by Trubo

1. Jin'rohk - Prot (for the 1h axe), Ret (for the belt and bracers)
2. Horridon - Ret (Bracers, Trinket)
3. Council - nothing drops that's major for either spec, probably stay Prot for chance at shared boss loot 1h Hit+Mastery sword
4. Tortos - Prot (for shared boss 1h and shared boss shield)
5. Megeara - Prot (see Tortos, also the tank belt isn't too bad either due to gem sockets)
6. Ji-Kun - Ret (Fabled Feather of Ji-Kun, not Rising Winds. Reforge Hit-> Haste. Go Prot for future kills once you have Fabled if you still need a 1h or shield due to shared boss drop)
7. Durumu - Ret (Bracers, Legs if you don't have tier) or Prot (Cloak+Gloves+Boots aren't bad due to the sockets on them making up for Dodge+Parry itemization)
8. Primordius - Prot (until you get a 1h+shield, also has tank legs and shoulders with sockets) then Ret (Ring mostly, also has DPS gloves that are Hit+Haste with sockets)
9. Dark Animus - Ret (no real reason to be Ret over Prot but the tank trinket is so bad I'd rather pass up an opportunity of getting shared boss items than risk getting that trinket. Only interested in Tier Chest and possibly Crit+Haste helm if you still need a 502)
10. Iron Qon - Prot (Tier Shoulders + Exp/Mastery 1h sword)
11. Twins - Doesn't really matter which spec you are other than Tier Helm has best chance as Prot.
12. Lei Shen - Prot (all the drops aren't too bad for tank but mostly chasing the shield if you need).

Jin-Rokh: Ret, not prot. belt and bracers far outweigh a one hand.
Horridon: Yes, ret
Council: If he needs a neck, the neck from ret is ok, otherwise it does not really matter. It drops a 2h sword for ret so if he is interested in a dps OS he shold for sure be ret here, but if he got neck and dont want 2h, he shold be prot.
Tortos: Holy for the shield or ret for the shoulders, not prot.
Megaera: The ring from ret is not terrible, if he needs the ring he should be retri, otherwise he could go prot, dont know what gear he got but if he is gearing up the prot belt is not terrible as it got 3 sockets.
Ji-Kun: Ret
Durumu: Ret
Primordius: Depends what you need, but imo ret. Ret got a lot better items in primordius than prot, unless you already have better items than the ret ones of course.
Dark Animus: Ret of course, the head is good.
Iron Qon: Depends what you need, the gloves are better than the weapon so whichever you need to most, ret for gloves and prot for weapon
Twins: Prot imo since it got higher chance of tier helm
LS: Prot got shield and trinket, ret got legs and 2h, both got the helmet, so whichever you need the most.

Volun-told - A supposedly optional event, award, assignment, or activity in which a person (or persons) are required to attend either by persons-in-charge nominating them or their peers expecting them to be there. The individual often has no say in the matter, and non-attendance in frowned upon.I am so tired of seeing terrible people, being admired, for being terrible people.

At the moment I have just levelled up my Paladin and am slowly building up his gear in LFR mode. Now I'm locked out on the lower 4 sets of LFR instances, what do you think I should be doing to speed up my ability to be a good tank?

I've already grinded the Mantid mobs at Nizuao Temple and am honoured with Wrathion and am slowly completing that questline. Is there anything else I could be doing to slowly better myself as a tank in my downtime? Perhaps grinding rep with a certain faction or doing dailies somewhere?

You are never locked out from LFR you can continue to run it without the chance at loot. If you just want to learn to tank then I would suggest running LFR some more for practise and heroic dungeons can teach you a little about aoe threat and managing large packs (as long as there's no raid geared dps in there to roflstomp mobs before you even get aggro).

If you're talking about GEARING then there are HC scenarios, crafted pieces, world boss drops, 502 boots from the barrens quest, treasure room key for extra bonus rolls in t14 LFR. There's plenty you can do aside from gearing through LFR

There's also some decent guides here on MMOC or on youtube. You should check out MikePreachwow on youtube as he has a fairly extensive grasp on the basics of every class and has vids for all of them as well as some more in depth workshops for specific specs.

I would suggest you to make a log of yourself doing LFR doing your best, then head over the Fix My Tanking thread in the paladin forums and ask for pointers, aswell as linking your armory etc.

I agree, there's no way to offer you good advice without knowing where you stand right now. You might already be decent, and advice will be mostly encounter specific and about gearing choices. Or you might be very inexperienced and making several fundamental mistakes, in which case gearing isn't too important at the moment. Go to World of Logs and upload some of yourself playing LFR.

Re: trinkets, I'm 545 ilvl and up until Ji-Kun's H feather dropped I had been using the Shado-Pan expertise trinket...it's a good trinket, well worth the valor.

To reach 480:
- Justice point to upgrade 463->471
- Honor point to buy pvp gear 476. You can farm Honor by killing the 5.1 rare pvp mobs every hour.
- Find at least one key on Thunder island to run a scenarii solo and have lot of elder charms.
- Run every 5.0 lfr, Sha of Fear and Gallion. Use charms on everything especially Sha and Gallion.
- Do the Barrens questline (boot 502 and a 489 piece)
- Buy valor gear (neck 522)
- Craft 5.0 and/or 5.2 if you can afford it.

shouldn't take more than a weekly reset to reach 480ilvl and start farming ToT lfr.

Should buy the expertise shado-pan assault trinket, after that focus on valor upgrades. You could possibly buy neck/ring if you have really shitty items there, but valor upgrades on your nice items are also okay.

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Jin-Rokh: Ret, not prot. belt and bracers far outweigh a one hand.
Horridon: Yes, ret
Council: If he needs a neck, the neck from ret is ok, otherwise it does not really matter. It drops a 2h sword for ret so if he is interested in a dps OS he shold for sure be ret here, but if he got neck and dont want 2h, he shold be prot.
Tortos: Holy for the shield or ret for the shoulders, not prot.
Megaera: The ring from ret is not terrible, if he needs the ring he should be retri, otherwise he could go prot, dont know what gear he got but if he is gearing up the prot belt is not terrible as it got 3 sockets.
Ji-Kun: Ret
Durumu: Ret
Primordius: Depends what you need, but imo ret. Ret got a lot better items in primordius than prot, unless you already have better items than the ret ones of course.
Dark Animus: Ret of course, the head is good.
Iron Qon: Depends what you need, the gloves are better than the weapon so whichever you need to most, ret for gloves and prot for weapon
Twins: Prot imo since it got higher chance of tier helm
LS: Prot got shield and trinket, ret got legs and 2h, both got the helmet, so whichever you need the most.

Yeah I will try this next reset. I didn't even know about loot spec til I read this which is really annoying as I was not familiar with MOP at all when I restarted my game time. But I am doing okay now. 485 ilvl and have all LFR encounters on reset. 15.04% expertise and 7.59% hit. Next time round I will sort out loot spec and hopefully get some decent drops, from then on my goal will be to join a medium level raiding guild.